« Shell small, ovate-conical, solid, sharp and glosssy; with six semi-convex whorls and a shallow linear suture. Longitudinally it has depressed ribs, wider than the interstices, smooth and not furrowed by the thin transversal lines, which are visible in the interstices and more pronounced on the base; the last whorl bears 10 to 11 shortened ribs, and 8 transversal cordlets. The lip is sharp, slightly furrowed inside, with a slightly enlarged and smooth external varice. Inside colour white purplish; the remainder is of a dark black or reddish colour, reminiscent of the ebony. » – S. Brusina: “Contribuzione pella fauna dei molluschi dalmati”, Verhandlungen der Kaiserlich-königlichen Zoologisch-botanisch Gesellschaft in Wien, Wien 1866, p.35-36. The species is mostly found on leaves in shallow Posidonia meadows, as this one that was found at 2-5m deep, Uvala Žorljevica, southern coast of Molat island, Zadar archipelago, Croatia. 3mm. Original pictures provided by A. Petani (HR) – (CC BY-NC-SA).

« I wanted to name this species after the noble paleontologist and malacologist Mr. Gustavo Schwartz de Morenstern, author of classic monographs on the Rissoina and Rissoa genuses, who was honoring me with his correspondence, gave me some of his works and helped me by the revision of the Dalmatian Rissoids. About my Rissoa ebenea, he wrote: “The second species, however, which in any case seems to descend from the Alvania Montagui and should form a branch of it, is new and has nowhere been observed; if they are not due to some local influences on Alvania Montagui, this dark colour in the shell as in the head and forefoot of the animal herald anyhow a separate species. If the common Alvania Montagui can also be found in the same location where this dark species is found, it can be assumed that it does not form a local variety of it, but rather a constant species existing alongside it, which is also indicated by their number and equality.” » – Ibid. Above ansd below: 20-30m deep, Savudrija, Umag, Istria Comitat, NW. Croatia. 3,1mm. Original pictures provided by A. Nappo (IT) – (CC BY-NC-SA).

The shell of schwartziana differs from that of discors by its smaller size, a shallower suture, the lower number of radials, the less marked spiral sculpture, a weaker labial varix. Protoconch paucispiral, globose, devoid of the numerous thin radial striae that are present on that of Alvania lineata, but bearing sparse granules (orange skin).